Monday, 30 April 2012

Tonight we are Walpurgis Night! So Happy Walpurgis Night everyone. This is the lesser known, Germanic, springtime Halloween. I know it mainly through the legend of Faust (Faust and Mephistopheles celebrate a Sabbath on the very night). I blogged about it years ago, when I started Vraie Fiction. I thought I would celebrate it tonight. I didn't know what to upload as a picture, something that looked appropriate. Then I went through some pics dad sent me and saw this picture of the Falls of Val-Jalbert. And I thought it would be ideal.

Why? Because this picture looks eerie and sinister, a bit reminiscent of the old Universal horror movies. Because Val-Jalbert is a ghost town (or ghost village) and well, tonight is a night of ghosts, devils and witches. Okay, it is a far off association, but when I grew up, this is how they "sold" it to the tourists: with ghosts (you could even buy ones at the tourists shop there). And because when my family went there with the neighbouring family one weekend around the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean, it was in May or June, my brothers and our friends (they are twin brothers) read in the evening Dracula's Guest, which is set on Walpurgis Night. Oh boy we had such a fright! You can find an animated adaptation of the story here. So during the day we visited a ghost town, during the evening (in a cottage in Sainte-Hedwidge), after eating a tourtière (true story), we read a horror story and went on a walk in the evening. I did little to celebrate tonight, but I have this memory which I wanted to share.

Sunday, 29 April 2012

I recently blogged about the paintings of Fabian Perez. Yesterday I went to the local art gallery where they are exposing his work. I was offered a glass of Prosecco and a guided tour by the lady who was there. I wonder if she thought I was a serious buyer. I fell a bit guilty, but I accepted the Prosecco and the tour anyway.

I was looking for a new painting to upload, wondering if I should upload one of his many paintings of femmes fatales. I settled for a man drinking spirits (whiskey?). I guess a femme fatale would have been too obvious. I thought this one had the right look for the blog. The man does look like a crime fiction character, maybe a mobster. I extensively wrote about what Perez's work remind me: old pulp fiction. I am not going to re-blog it. I just thought that the painting would bring some colours and character to this blog.

This was taken by my father, I don't know when. He sent it to me recently. You can see the cathedral in the center (the Saint-François Xavier Cathedral, but we always called it "the cathedral"), the hospital in the background on the left and the cégep in the background on the right. In front, the Saguenay river, which looks very much like low on water, even though Chicoutimi means "where the water is deep". It does not look like it from this picture.

I posted it here for a few reasons. The first is that I had never uploaded a picture of Chicoutimi before, except of my parents' house or garden. But nothing looked typically Chicoutimian. How does a city look like anyway? This one is pretty much a picture for a postcard. So this is the city where I grew up. I used to walk up and down its slopes, I had my Confirmation at the cathedral (but not my First Communion, whih was done in a small parish), I went to the cégep after high school, I went to the hospital there, this is the city that I was shaped in and which shaped me. I also uploaded it because of this quote from Larry Tremblay's The Dragonfly of Chicoutimi, which I posted on this blog more than once (it shows my obsession with the play)

"Chicoutimi is an Amerindian wordit means up to where the water is deepthis word refers to the Saguenaya big a beautiful a splendid riverbut Chicoutimi as a town is uglyas every American townand this ugliness is very interestingbut fortunately nature surrounds every townin this countryand nature cannot be ugly"

And I find it funny because here, you don't see the ugly blandness of the city, which Gaston Talbot refers to as a town. I mean sure, it is not Rome, but it is pretty. And the Saguenay here does not look like a big, beautiful, splendid river. I always thought the picture Talbot makes of the city was pretty much spot on, right on the money. You look at this, and you think the picture must be lying, yet it is very much the city I grew up in.

Saturday, 28 April 2012

I was out today to buy the bare necessities of life, as the temperature was relatively calm. It will get back to it's normal Dommsday self tomorrow. I stopped quickly at Clinton Cards and found... Halloween chocolates from Thorton's (Jack O'Lanterns in chocolate). They were dramatically reduced, so I bought some. It does feel a lot like Halloween anyway these days, what with the temperature and all. And we are half a year away from it. It might seem like this is totally out of season, but there is a sort of Halloween day coming: Walpurgis Night, which is in the night between April and May. It is the springtime's equivalent of Halloween: marking the passage of one season to another. It is lesser known and less celebrated, but for those who miss the spooky season, they might want to do a little something to celebrate it.

Friday, 27 April 2012

There I said it. I just don't enjoy my sandwich as much. I didn't enjoy it today anyway. I had almost the usual: smoked salmon baguette with horseradish sauce, Coca Cola and cashew on the side. Except that there was not enough smoked salmon so I got my baguette filled with what was left of shrimps, or prawns as they call it here. So Smoked salmon, prawns, horseradish sauce, red onion, tomatoes, salad... And it did nothing to me. I mean yes, I enjoyed it, but it barely registered. And I don't feel like a special customer anymore and I don't feel like it is special either. So I need to change my treats, maybe even change my Friday blog posts topics altogether.

Wednesday, 25 April 2012

I feel like I am blogging about the weather all the time, or too often anyway these days, and this is getting ridiculously mundane, but sometimes I find my inspiration on the mundane. More than a month ago I said I wanted to blog about literature. Unfortunately I have little energy for it just now.And the weather is pretty much on everybody's mind at the moment.

But yes, every day, we have heavy showers, the wind is often strong and it looks grey and miserable. A colleague told me yesterday, on my way home (we share the same commute, minus one train station for him): "I have never seen an April month that looked so much like April". This was so accurate a statement and so funny that I am adding it as a great unknown line. This morning, I walked to the train station in the rain, I was soaking wet. In the afternoon, there was a thunderstorm. But the storm is not hot like the ones we have during summertime: they are cold. Spring is a temperamental, nasty season, April is an even more temperamental, nasty month. It feels like walking through, every day, a relentless Apocalypse. The storms are beautiful though. At least there is beauty in this furious weather.

Tuesday, 24 April 2012

I just remember that I missed Earth Day, or I didn't commemorate it on this blog. Better late than never, I guess. I have always wanted to upload here this song, used in an advert for the Discovery Channel. I challenge anyone to not feel uplifted listening to it and watching this videoclip. It was released in 2008. There was a sequel. But nothing beats the original. It is a feel good song, but it is also makes you marvel. Both simple and grandiose. The world is just awesome.

Monday, 23 April 2012

Last weekend, on my birthday in fact (nice time for an epiphany), I found this artist, Fabian Perez (Argentinian born artist now living in Los Angeles) in a local gallery. I was impressed enough about the work of Perez I saw that I took a leaflet (where I found the information about him being from Argentina and living in LA), even though I cannot afford one single painting. The people at the gallery could tell about ten seconds and they ignored me completely, but I could still enjoy the aesthetic of it. I would love to be wealthy enough to buy one, or better still: I wish I could be selling these paintings for a job. This is what came to my mind immediately when I saw them: I want to spend my days here, being paid to watch them, to tell the customers why they should own one, why this is great stuff.

I am not really an art connoisseur, in fact I am pretty much of a philistine. But when I love pictural art, I love it immensely and without compromission. The universe Fabian Perez paints is often an old fashioned one, filled with glamorous and grim nostalgia. It is a world of dim lights and growing shadows, of femmes fatales (many, many of them), hardboiled guys, sinister men, all chain smoking and hard drinking. It is the world of Eros and Thanatos. It is, in a nutshell, the universe of crime fiction from old pulp magazines, with a latin twist. The painting I uploaded here is called Gathering at Los Brujas, and this could be the title of a novel. Like for the Detective Tales cover I upload every month, the work of Fabian Perez set my imagination on fire. I wish I could have words that were as eloquent as these images, that could create an atmosphere as efficiently, with such rich colours and character. If I ever write the great crime fiction novel from Québec, I want an artist like him to draw the cover, although I wonder if his latin world can work with the Northern one I come from. In any case, I will upload more of his works here, just like I do with Detective Tales.

Sunday, 22 April 2012

I have been reading a novel (never mind which one) and I am about to finish the last few pages. And I discovered something today: I lost half the plot between the beginning, which I was following eagerly, and the now soon to be end. The characters mix in my head, I remember a few memorable scenes, a few nice descriptions, but the rest... The core of the novel, I forgot it. It is crime fiction, I think it is even good crime fiction, yet it is one of those books that went way over my head.

I am ashamed to say it. I made my life studying literature, it is maybe the thing I do best. And yet, since I started studying it at university, I took this very, very bad habit of, well, reading words, getting through the book, and not being able to stick it in my mind. This time, maybe it is caused by the fact that I have two or three books I am reading at once. Maybe it is because I am already looking at the next book I am going to read. But I wish I was never an absent minded reader.

Saturday, 21 April 2012

It is my birthday today, I have the venerable age of 35. I didn't know exactly how to blog about it, I mean blogging it differently than how I did it before. And then I just thought about some memories I have from my birthdays. As an adult, a birthday is just one extra day, you are one day older than before, unless you start thinking that you are getting old. But as a child, it is something magical.

So for some reason today, I had in mind a precise birthday gift I had: when I was 9 or 10 (or maybe younger), I received the life of Mozart on a disc, narrated by Gérard Philippe, from the collection Le Petit Ménestrel. They still sell it, but in CDs. My first Petit Ménestrel was the life of Beethoven, which turned me into a fan, but I think Mozart had a lasting impression on me, for one single reason: there was Finch'han dal vino, an aria from Don Giovanni, on it. It got me hooked on the opera, which I received at my next year's birthday. Since then, Don Giovanni is my favourite opera. My brothers and I used to play the last scene. And it all started with this single aria, which I have been listening to today. So I decided to upload it here, my birthday gift to my readership. It is sung by the baritone Simon Keenlyside. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed it when I first heard it.

Friday, 20 April 2012

Sometimes circumstances change your usual treat. Like today. I had made my own salmon sandwich with horseradish sauce on... Monday, as I had made it myself. It was not as good really, but anyway. So I decided to have the usual, but with Philadelphia cheese instead of horseradish sauce. The guys at the sandwich shop know me well enough, so they know exactly what I will ask, minus one or two details. I had the usual Coca Cola on the side, however, as they didn't have cashew nuts, I had chilli flavoured roasted peanuts instead.

And on my way back home, I stopped at one of the local wine shops to taste some samples. On an empty stomach and tired, it is a sure way to get to your head quickly, but it was so pleasant. I won't mind the headache later.

Thursday, 19 April 2012

Before I begin bloggint this post, I have to admit, to warn my readership about it if theye xpect something half interesting: this may be a very banal, uninteresting topic, something epically trivial, especially here in England. But trivial topics are maybe the more relevant topics for a blog about irrelevant and trivial stuff. Blogging is often putting words into trivialities. I tried to find a grey and gloomy picture to fit the topic and the circumstances. If the post is not very interesting, at least the picture will be ncie to look at. Rain can be beautiful and bring character to places. There is an aesthetic to gloomy weather and I hope the picture illustrates this.

Anyway, so this is what I wanted to talk about: the weather is very temperamental and prone to heavy rains and today even storms. Yesterday it poured rain, today it poured rain. And there are forecasting more heavy showers this weekend. Today I was lucky enough to walk to work and then to home when it was not raining, but yesterday there were heavy showers during my whole commute and in between. I did enjoy it, somehow, somewhat. It has character. Rain can be monotonous, but heavy showers are not really. They can be disruptive, but they sure are impressive.

Tuesday, 17 April 2012

No, not the chocolate candy! I am talking about the cherry blossom, the real thing. A Japanese colleague told me today via messenger that it was the end of sakura season, meaning cherry blossom season. From what I understood it is the name they have for April and springtime. Which I thought was very sweet. Then I quickly read about the symbolism of the cherry tree in Japan. And I learn that it has violent meaning, that it was the name of a society of young men in the Imperial Japanese Army and it can have a very militaristic significance. Cherry blossoms. I just couldn't believe it, but yet this something very Japanese, a culture that looks very delicate in their art and environment, yet gave birth to seppuku, kamikazes and yakuzas. So the delicate cherry blossoms represent also the relentless waves of armies marching. A fitting image for spring and April, in a way, a season and a month both prone to elemental anger as much as it represents fertility.

Sunday, 15 April 2012

April 2012 is such a sharp contrast with April 2011, where it was de facto summertime. Today, just like the last week or so, it was cold and windy. It is sometimes overcast, but even sunny like today it is cold. April is a treacherous month, it can really go either way. If it was not for the blossoming trees and flowers, I would think it is autumn. In fact, if it does not look like autumn, it feels like autumn, much more than it did last year. It is true that last year's seasons were schizophrenic: heatwaves in spring, a cool summer, a summery autumn, it was everywhere.

So instead of craving light summery food, I am in the mood for hearty meals (fish pie tonight) and dark ales. I had one last week, Milkwood, a Welsh beer, which was delicious and fitted the temperature perfectly. I don't want to turn this blog into a food and drinks blog, I mean I have enough of the sandwich treat every Friday, but I thought I would mention the beer and upload an image of its label here. Because it fits the day too.

Saturday, 14 April 2012

There are lots of stupid stuff one reads in the Metro, it is as ligh a read as one can find. But I guess that's what happens with a free newspaper. I read it mainly for Nemi. But then there is the odd article that for some reason makes me cheerful (like when I read about the hobbit home made by a Welsh family). This interview with James Bowen, a man I knew nothing about, got my attention like this. That he got off the street and off an heroin addiction because of a cat, I find it both moving and fitting. However I can despair of mankind, I never despair of cats. They are superior creatures. For some reason, they have not taken over this world. I think they would make a better job than us. But in any case, they make our civilisation a bit more civilised.

Friday, 13 April 2012

It was (is still) Friday the 13th. I don't think I am superstitious, but maybe this is why I decided to play it safe with the sandwich treat: smoked salmon baguette, horseradish sauce, the usual trimming, Coca Cola and cashew nuts on the side... I am not being original. And the funny thing is that I had smoked salmon bagels earlier on this week, so it's not like I was craving something I didn't have for a long time. But expected pleasures are no less pleasurable. Not much to say, then, except one thing: this Friday the 13th didn't jinx my lunch. It was still delicious.

Thursday, 12 April 2012

At work today, we saw a picture of a colleague who is on holiday in Scotland, where these days it is cold and snowy. In April. And there was a good deal of snow on the picture. My colleagues joked about it, saying his family sure wished they'd be in Spain or Italy now. They were freezing just looking at the picture. But I said I didn't mind this kind of weather. In April. So one of my colleagues said: "Oh, of course, because you are Canadian" (they seem to be making a big deal of me being Canadian these days). I said: "I was literally born in this kind of weather, in April". They teased me a bit ("what, outside, in the storm, like this?" and so on). One of them said something funny enough to qualify as a great unknown line: "Raised by wolves, he was." It made me laugh anyway, and even if it was teasing I do wish it was a true, I do think people perceive me as coming from a savage Northern land.

But it is absolutely almost true: if when I was born it was a summery day, very warm, even hot, a few days later, when I left hospital, there was a snow storm. It is a story my mother loves to tell. I think I may have told it here on Vraie Fiction already. But growing up in the North did mark me and I think I do think it also had an influence on the perception people have of me. Here it is exotic, almost Scottish.

Wednesday, 11 April 2012

The workplace is a great source of great unknown lines, as I discovered again today. One of my colleagues had to ask me to do some quick work I am not paid for and have little time to do. She is a very nice, friendly colleague and knows how to sugarcoat her request, so before asking me, she said: "Guillaume, you are the best Canadian in this department". To which I replied: "Good to know, as I am the only Canadian in this department." Which is funny, but not quite true: I am not really Canadian.

Monday, 9 April 2012

This month's Detective Tales cover was really difficult to find. Because I already uploaded two a few years ago, here and here, and I find both these covers the best ones of April, and in the second case maybe the best cover of Detective Tales I saw. So I was kind of stuck. After a lot of hesitation, I settled for the 1936 cover, even though it is not the best one. Not that it has no qualities. There is a lot of action going on, too much to handle for the guy who drew it maybe. We have the fierce redhead and the hero taking a young child from a bed. He is still asleep, or very sleepy, even though a lot is happening around him and it must be a noisy environment: two gangsters are barging in, gun blazing and one is already shooting. I presume the child has been kidnapped, from his clothes he must comes from a wealthy family. I can bet he was kidnapped by some mobsters and held for ransom and the detective and the redhead have come to rescue him. The two goons are idiots: if a lost bullet kills the child, what are they going to do?

That said, I do love the action and the characters. For once, there is no fancy dressed villains like last month or in December. Just some regular thugs, dressed soberly and quick to use guns, no cane-sword. The danger is immediate, obvious. And I love the contrast between the threat, the violence, the brutality of the combat that is starting and the delicate appearance of the child's direct environment. So there you have it, another pulp fiction cover.

Sunday, 8 April 2012

This picture was taken in Kew Gardens last year. it is made of chocolate. It was taken shortly after Easter, a week I think. Last year's April had been ridiculously nice and summery. Easter arrived much earlier this year and April so far has not been as nice. Today it is cold and overcast. I think it might rain.

But anyway, it is Easter, so I thought to upload this picture of an Easter bunny. Chocolate Easter bunnies are my favourite chocolate Easter figures. Sure, out of greed I used to have the large squirrel from Lulu when I was a child, because it was one of their biggest figurines, but I really think the rabbit is the animal that really symbolises Easter. There is the egg, yes, the hen, of course, both symbols of fertility in their own right, but for me it is the bunny rabbit.

Saturday, 7 April 2012

Before dinner, I went to a pub (the local Irish pub) for a quick drink. I thought taking the apéritif would be nice. I had a real ale, only half a pint, then another one in another pub. And then I went to Wimpy's and it was maybe a mistake because now I feel full. But anyway, the first crowd was very crowded, there was some sport on TV, I think it was cricket but I could be wrong. It could have been anything, I am indifferent to sports on TV. I once blogged a bit about pub crowds. Unlike that time when I went with my friends from the acting class, this evening I went alone.I love pubs, but I always find it a strange experience when I am not, or no more, a regular.

I have been a regular in only a few pubs/bars in my life. You know when you are one if the staff knows you by your name and if you can talk to the people around you as well, if you know them, at least a bit, enough for a conversation. I literally just ordered a drink, drank it and that's it. I don't know if one can see if someone does not belong to the crowd.

Friday, 6 April 2012

I was wondering what music to upload on a Good Friday. Then I thought of my recent post about Ennio Morricone, and it reminded me that he wrote the soundtrack of Moses the Lawgiver. It is a little known movie, that was always shadowed by the far inferior, Hollywoodian Biblical epic The Ten Commandments. I saw Moses first, it was shown around Easter when Jesus of Nazareth (made by the same team) was not aired. The film is flawed, it has a very low budget for a Biblical movie, which sometimes weakens the movie. But it has a very intelligent script, written by, yes, you guessed it, Anthony Burgess. This movie is brilliant as it is a deconstruction of the Exodus myth, as well as an exploration of existentialist themes. And, well, Ennio Morricone wrote the music. And it is a beautiful and haunting music (it's Morricone so it has to be haunting and beautiful).So I uploaded the main theme here.

Thursday, 5 April 2012

Do not worry: I am not talking about what I am going to have tomorrow morning. No, I will enjoy peanut butter toasts. Simple but delicious. But I am watching the second season of The Wire (again) and this is what the dockers have. They order it as breakfast. It is a startling image, seeing them drinking beer with a raw egg in the morning. As a child I once drank a bit of raw egg by mistake, thinking it was milk, I still remember the disgusting taste. I had a quick look on Google and there is info about it on Yahoo and elsewhere. I have no doubt this is authentic tradition, in Baltimore and probably elsewhere. I wonder if anyone who read this have heard of it outside fiction and witnessed it, or better still, have tried the unusual breakfast themselves.

Wednesday, 4 April 2012

It is not related to the month, so maybe the title of this post is misleading. So today a colleague on the continent asked me on Instant Messenger (technology is an amazing thing sometimes) asked me how I was. I answered: "Okay, but tired. I slept badly. Sleep eludes me, except during daytime." I don't know what was his reaction, but I thought it was funny enough to be a great unknown line. My first one blogged since the middle of March. It was about time.

Tuesday, 3 April 2012

It is the Holy Week, the week coming to Easter. I barely noticed it. The end of Lent was more exciting during my Catholic childhood: I used to avoid chocolate during the whole period, until Easter Sunday, when I stuffed myself. Ah the memories! Now I can have chocolate any day and it is not even naughty for a believer to stuff himself. But the Godless man I am enjoy his Holy Week differently: I intend, when I can gather the energy after work, to watch some documentaries about the Bible. Not the devout Christian kind, I mean the secular, historical, truth matters kind. I find the deconstruction of myths, Christian or others, a fascinating field of studies. For the unbeliever, the Christian heritage is the lot of the archeologist, the historian, the anthropologist, sometimes the man of literature.

Sunday, 1 April 2012

This afternoon, I renewed with a long forgotten treat I used to give myself: read in a pub. I recommend it to everyone who wants to cope with the Sunday blues. I could have read at home, but sometimes being outside and not socialise but feel other people's presence is good. I used to do it quite often when I was unemployed, just sit in a not too busy pub, have a real ale, not more than hanf a pint (at first anyway) and read a few pages. Then go home. This is what I did: I drank half a pint in the local Irish pub, which only had a few punters watching football and I read.